Criminal Case Files

Teenage relations, whether purely sexual or borne of genuine feelings, have a reputation for being intense. Couple surging hormones with peer pressure, inflamed reactions, impulsivity, unrealized childhood trauma, and potentially undiagnosed mental illness, and you have a guaranteed recipe for chaos. Go figure.

When 17-year-old Elizabeth Jean “Betty” Williams of Odessa, Texas, was dumped by her casual boyfriend of a few months, 17-year-old John “Mack” Herring in the summer of 1961, she described her emotions as tragically unbearable. Betty, who had a reputation for being an outcast and promiscuous, with strong, progressive beliefs—something that wasn’t warmly welcomed in the 1960s, especially for a young woman, and especially in West Texas—began expressing openly to her peers that she wanted to die. Mental health wasn’t paid much attention back then, so Betty was written off as being dramatic and attention-seeking, as was judged of her personality.

What most people didn’t realize until long after her death, was that Betty had reached a breaking point, which started with the breakup but wasn’t purely caused by it. Family problems, academic letdown, a grim future outlook, and plummeting self-esteem followed in close succession of the breakup, which left Betty feeling broken. She often wrote in her diary about feeling alone and misunderstood.

Unfortunately, Betty was also frequently bullied by her peers for her differences, and disliked by many of her female classmates because she was sex-positive and open to sexual encounters. In her bedroom, Betty had access to a door that led outside and into an alleyway, and she often snuck out after her parents fell asleep. Betty frequently escaped to the drive-in movie theater, Tommy’s Drive-In, where she had sexual encounters with her male classmates, many of whom had girlfriends. These girlfriends were known as “cashmere girls”; they were from wealthier neighborhoods, members of unofficial “sororities” and stood together at football games wearing their boyfriends’ letterman jackets. They hardly looked Betty’s way, unless it was to snicker as she walked by.

Throughout the winter and spring of 1961, Betty’s despair reached the point of suicidal ideation and attempts. She also started asking her peers if they’d kill her—and she was serious. Again, Betty’s peers wrote her off as being dramatic, and no one took her requests seriously.

No one, except for Mack.

Betty expressed to Mack that she dreamt of death, fantasized about heaven, and adamantly no longer wanted to live. Surprisingly, Mack agreed to “help” her. And so, on the evening of Wednesday, March 22, 1961, Betty left her home under the guise of attending theater practice for an upcoming school play, hitching a ride with a friend, Ike Nail. Ike brought Betty home afterwards around 10 pm. Betty pretended to enter through the front door, but secretly waited in the alleyway for Mack to pick her up. The next morning, Betty’s mother awoke to find her daughter’s bedroom door locked. Betty never locked her bedroom door, so when her mother gained entry and found Betty wasn’t there, she placed a frantic call to police.

That day, Betty’s body was discovered submerged in a body of water nearly 30 miles outside of town. She was nearly decapitated her head, having suffered a single gunshot wound from a shotgun, fired at close range.

Mack led police to her body.

Mack stood trial twice for Betty’s murder the first of which became sensational in the area. Everyone in Odessa knew about the murder—and arguably, nearly everyone was also on Mack’s side. Shockingly, Mack walked free, never serving any prison time for Betty’s murder.

How did a self-confessed killer walk free?

Did Betty really ask Mack to kill her, or was that a cover-up?

Below, we’ll dive in to the murder of Betty Williams, known as the “Kiss and Kill Murder.”

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Betty Williams, a Young Woman Ahead of Her Time

Elizabeth Jean “Betty” Williams was born on August 11, 1943 in Marion, Illinois, to parents John Washington Williams and Mary Belle Williams. She was the eldest of four children, which included Patricia Lynn, Kathryn, and Joseph Wayne, who died at the age of one. In 1955, when Betty was 12 years old, her family relocated nearly 1,000 miles west from Goreville, Illinois to Odessa, Texas, a city in West Texas.

Odessa was known for its booming oil and gas industry, and recently saw its population grow to some 80,000 people. The Williams family settled in a modest home near the oil fields, and they struggled to make ends meet. Betty’s father, a devout Baptist, worked odd jobs, typically doing carpentry work, but rarely found stable employment. Her mother worked as a clerk at J.C. Penney. As a teen, Betty worked part-time at Woolworth’s, a discount store.

Because of Betty’s nonconformist ways, she was treated as the “black sheep” of the family. Her father often blamed Betty for misfortunes affecting the family, attributing these happenings to Betty’s immorality. His treatment of Betty only worsened with time, as he caught wind of her promiscuity and encounters with young men.

While Betty was ostracized at home, she was also ostracized by her peers. She was known as an outcast at Odessa High School. Though she didn’t wish to fit in, per say, she longed to belong and be accepted for who she was. Betty’s peers simply didn’t understand her. She loved reading, listening to progressive stand-up and was a fan of Jack Kerouac, Allan Ginsberg and other Beat Generation writers. She adamantly believed that schools shouldn’t be segregated and often vocalized such, despite being from a segregated area. She was also sex positive. Betty probably would have fared much better, and found happiness, had she been in her late teens during the peak of the Free Love Movement.

Bold and opinionated, Betty liked to get a rise out of people and she relished in the attention. She was known to wear all black outfits with white lipstick, just to see others’ reactions. Or, she dressed in shorts and a t-shirt, forgoing her bra. In fact, she was known to not wear bras.

Betty aspired to become a Broadway actress. Her bedroom walls gleaned with posters of popular movies and playbills. In high school, she found solace in theater, starring as Juliet in the play, Romeo and Juliet, during her junior year, and performing in three other plays that same year. She relished in the opportunity to get into character and transform on stage. It was the only place she felt free to be herself. Though Betty knew that her parents couldn’t afford to send her to college, she planned to attend Odessa College upon graduation, and start on her path to hopeful stardom.

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When Betty Falls For Mack

Betty and Mack were friends for a few years before they began having relations. Both teens were very different, but perhaps that’s what drew them to each other, albeit temporarily. Mack, born on September 23, 1943, was a varsity football player who was well-liked by his peers and a skilled hunter. He was also involved in theater production, like Betty. Mack was raised in an upper-middle class home, where he lived with his parents and younger brother, Jack. His father, Herald Omar Herring was a World War II veteran and owned his own electrician business and his mother, Margaret Elizabeth Herring, was a homemaker.

Mack was drawn to Betty’s unique personality. He found her interesting. Betty liked that Mack’s mind ran deeper than the simpleton conversations that bored her. He could keep up with her, mentally, better than other young men. He was also sensitive and romantic, more so than other boys her age. She liked that, and fell hard for him. Almost immediately after they started dating in the summer of 1960, Betty claimed to be “in love” with Mack.

Betty’s feelings deepened, but Mack’s actions didn’t align with the intensity of hers. He never introduced her to his friends or family, brought her to house parties, or gave her his letterman jacket to wear. He wanted to keep his relationship with Betty secret, perhaps because of her promiscuous reputation. As Mack pulled back, Betty tried making him jealous in attempts to lure him closer. In a move she’d deeply regret, Betty allegedly had sexual relations with another football player and one of Mack’s friends, Billie Rose. When Mack found out, he broke up with Betty immediately.

Betty was devastated at their relationship ending. She fell hard for Mack, and really wanted to be with him. Nonetheless, Mack went on to date someone else by the fall; someone he felt comfortable introducing to his friends and family. Betty was heartbroken. She wrote him the following letter:

Mack,

Well, I guess you accomplished what you set out to do. You hurt me, more than you’ll ever know. When you handed me that note this morning, you virtually changed the course of my life. I don’t [know] what I expected the note to say, but not that. I’ll not waste time saying that I didn’t deserve it because I guess I did. I’ve never been so hurt in my life and I guess your note was the jolt I needed to get me back on the straight and narrow. I’ve done a lot of things, I know, that were bad and cheap, but I swear before God that I didn’t mean them to be like that. I was just showing off. I know it’s much too late with you, Mack, but I swear that another boy won’t get the chance to say what you said to me. You’ve made me realize that instead of being smart and sophisticated like I thought, I was only being cheap and ugly and whorish.

Forgive me for writing this last note and thank you for reading it.

I’ll not trouble you again, and Mack, I haven’t forgotten the good times we had. I really have enjoyed knowing you and I’m awfully sorry that it had to end this way …

Best of luck with your steady girlfriend. I hope she’s the best.

Betty

P.S. When you think of me try to think of the good times we had and not of this.

To make matters worse for Betty, her classmates soon learned about her sexual involvement with Billie Rose and other young men at the drive-in. She was bullied relentlessly and nothing was done to stop it. Like mental health, bullying also wasn’t taken seriously back then.

Soon after, a new teacher was hired to oversee the theater department, and Betty was demoted from lead actress to theater manager. The teacher also told Betty that she lacked talent, which stung especially hard because she longed to become an actress. Also around this time, Betty’s father discovered and read her diary after looking for evidence of Betty’s wrongdoing in her room. Her diary outlined her sexual escapades and naturally, her religious father was furious.

Having endured being bullied by her peers, demoted in theater, dumped by her boyfriend, and unaccepted by her father, Betty began struggling emotionally. By the winter of 1961, she started openly expressing her desire to die.

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The Murder

One day in the spring of 1961, Mack offered to drive Betty and another classmate, Howard Sellers, home from theater practice. On the way, Betty proposed her question to Mack: Would he be willing to kill her? The teens laughed together about Betty’s absurd request, with Mack immediately assuming it was a dark joke. However, the following day at theater practice, Betty urged Mack that she was desperate; she truly wanted to die. She promised to write a letter absolving Mack of all responsibility, if he would only take on the task of killing her. On Wednesday, March 22, 1961, her grim fantasy became reality.

That night, after theater practice, while Betty was sitting in the car with Ike, Mack pulled up to the alleyway behind her parents’ home. Betty hopped into his car, wearing her pajamas. Then, the pair drove 26 miles to a property where Mack’s father maintained a hunting lease, and walked down a steep hill to a stock tank, which is used to wash livestock. Mack asked Betty for a kiss, to remember her by; a moment responsible for the crime’s namesake as the “Kiss and Kill Murders.” Betty told him, “Thank you, Mack. I will always remember you for that.” Then, she knelt down, directed the 12-gauge shotgun to her temple, and said, “now.”

And shoot, he did.

Once deceased, Mack tied weights to Betty’s body to keep her underneath the water.

Police quickly assumed Mack as a suspect. After Betty’s mother called police to report their daughter missing, police went to Betty’s school to conduct interviews with students. In these interviews, they learned about Betty’s character, reputation, and ultimately about her last being seen with Mack. Mack was brought to the police station for questioning. Initially, Mack denied any involvement in Betty’s death, but 45 minutes later, he confessed to killing Betty. Later that day, he led police to her body. Oddly, when police arrived at the crime scene, they instructed Mack to remove his clothes, with the exception of his underwear, and bring Betty’s body to the surface.

Mack obliged and was subsequently arrested.

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The Trial Begins: The State of Texas v. John Mack Herring

News of Mack’s arrest spread quickly through Odessa. People were in disbelief that someone “like Mack” could commit such an act; “like Mack” essentially meaning a Caucasian all-American football player from a good family. Opinions formed that suggested if Mack had been involved in Betty’s death, he must have had good reason to be—or, perhaps he was convinced to do so. Whatever the case, he remained accepted by his community and included in happenings with his friends. He was still invited to houseparties and movies at the drive-in, and young women still asked him to spend time with them. In fact, the crime made Mack ever-more popular and sought after by females his age.

Because public opinion labeled Mack as “a nice guy,” whispers around town centered on bashing Betty. People referred to Betty as a “slut” and “manipulative,” essentially blaming her for coercing Mack to commit such a crime. The tendency to fault Betty entirely for what happened only grew more pronounced during the trial.

On February 20, 1962, The State of Texas v. John Mack Herring officially began. Warren Burnett, a 34-year-old attorney and former Marine from Odessa, defended Mack. Luck was on Mack’s side, because Warren was one of the top attorneys in the area; at 25, he became the youngest practicing attorney in the Odessa area. Not a single one of Warren’s clients had been sent to prison.

The trial was led by District Court Judge G. C. Olsen and Dan Sullivan, 32, defended the state. Unlike Warren, Dan’s experience spanned about a year and focused mostly on DWIs and theft cases.

By today’s standards, Mack would undoubtedly be found guilty and serve prison time:

• He gave police a full confession
• He showed little to no emotion for the victim
• He led police to Betty’s body
• He stated the murder was premeditated
• He brought along items to help him commit the murder: a shotgun with ammo, rope, lead weights to weigh down Betty’s body, and a miner’s helmet to provide light as he ensured her body was fully submerged

However, Mack’s attorney concocted a story that he was confident would win over the jury. His plan was to argue the insanity plea, pledging that Mack was insane at the time of the crime. He requested for Judge Olsen to focus the trial on whether or not Mack was deemed insane, and not on whether he actually committed the murder. In a shocking move, Judge Olsen agreed with Warren, and determined that Mack wouldn’t stand trial for murder—his role in the murder itself was clear—but instead, the jury would deliberate whether Mack was insane or not at the time of the killing. Mack was not to be evaluated by a psychiatrist during the trial because his current mental state was not of concern—only his mental state at the time of the crime.

The trial became a local sensation, and one that was filled with teenagers, most of them female. Many young women became infatuated with Mack and flocked to his trial to steal glimpses of him. The media nicknamed these young women “Mack’s girls.”

Everyone in the courtroom was there with the belief that Mack should walk free. The only people present to support Betty were her parents—not even a single friend stepped forward for her.

Many people took the stand to speak on Mack’s behalf, including several classmates and his own father. Mack himself even testified. The most compelling testimony, however, was given by Marvin Grice, a psychiatrist in Odessa, who evaluated Mack three days after the murder. The psychiatrist stated that Mack experienced such a high level of stress as a result of Betty’s request, that he believed he was doing her a favor by killing her; essentially, it was a mercy killing, in Mack’s mind. The psychiatrist’s statements aligned with Mack’s own testimony, during which he expressed that in hindsight, he knew killing Betty was wrong, but that night, he believed he was helping her gain entry to heaven, which was a topic she talked about a lot.

Betty hers or didn’t want Mack to be held responsible for her death, and she thought of such before the act was committed. In attempts to absolve him of his role in her murder, she left behind the following letter dated March 20, 1961, which was shared with the court:

I want everyone to know that what I’m about to do in no way implicates anyone else. I say this to make sure that no blame falls on anyone other than myself.
I have depressing problems that concern, for the most part, myself. I’m waging a war within myself, a war to find the true me and I fear that I am losing the battle. So rather than admit defeat I’m going to beat a quick retreat into the no man’s land of death. As I have only the will and not the fortitude necessary, a friend of mine, seeing how great is my torment, has graciously consented to look after the details.
His name is Mack Herring and I pray that he will not have to suffer for what he is doing for my sake. I take upon myself all blame, for there it lies, on me alone!

Betty Williams

After only deliberating for 11 hours, the jury determined Mack was insane at the time of the murder. Despite the obvious, no one considered that Mack had the capacity to decline Betty’s request, but only that Betty was at fault for involving him.

A Second Trial is Held

Attorney Dan Sullivan, representing the state, motioned for an appeal, stating that Judge Olsen did not have the power to pre-determine the trial should only focus on Mack’s sanity at the time of the murder, and nothing else. On June 27, 1962, a new trial began, only this time it was held in Beaumont, nearly 600 miles away, in attempts to escape the influence of local publicity.

Attorney Warren Burnett took control of the courtroom once again. He brought back the psychiatrist, along with a slew of students, some teachers and Mack’s football coach to defend his character. Warren argued that nearly two years later, no motive was ever established. What would Mack have to gain by killing Betty? he asked the courtroom. And once again, the jury agreed. On December 13, 1962, Mack was found not guilty by reason of insanity for a second time.

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Mack’s Life Post-Trial

Everyone in the area knew Mack Herring because of the crime and subsequent trial. Despite the crime attracting such publicity, he remained local, and the community embraced him.

He went on to pursue a degree at Texas Tech University in Lubbock, and subsequently returned to Odessa, where he never had another run in with the law again. For most of his adult life, more than 25 years, he followed in his father’s footsteps and worked as an electrician. He also worked as a carpenter, welder and as a dock foreman, and married and divorced twice.

Over time, the sensationalism surrounding Mack faded. He lived a quiet, private and conservative life until his passing on January 5, 2019, at the age of 75.

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Remembering Betty Williams

Even though so many years have passed, Betty is often remembered at Odessa High School, where her murder is recalled as something of an urban legend. Strange occurrences at the school, like slamming doors, flickering lights and sounds of footsteps, particularly in the theater room, are commonly attributed to Betty. After Betty’s passing, her cousin, Shelton Williams, went on to publish a book in 2006 about Betty and the aftermath of her murder titled, Washed in the Blood.

Betty was a woman ahead of her time. Her views were bold and progressive. She embraced her individuality and was unapologetically herself, though she wished that someone would embrace and understand her. Initially, she thought it was Mack, but perhaps she over-romanticized the relationship.

With troubles at home and bullying at school, Betty likely felt a perpetual sense of unacceptance. Perhaps she earned the reputation of being promiscuous because having relations with men, was the closest she was able to feel with anyone; her attempt at intimacy without having to reveal too much of her inner self. Perhaps, it was also something of an escape. While female friends avoided her, men welcomed her, even if the reasoning was mostly sexual. That all being said, I’m not a psychologist by any means, but I do believe Betty had some form of mental illness and/or personality disorder. Her symptoms and behaviors, in my uneducated opinion, appear reminiscent of borderline personality disorder, but I’m in no position to suggest a true diagnosis.

If Betty were to have lived past the too-young age of 17, I imagine she’d made a difference. I see her as someone who would’ve left Odessa and gone elsewhere, perhaps a big city like New York or Los Angeles. I believe she would have embraced the underdogs she came along—the forgotten and down on their luck. She’d feel compassion for them and they’d relate to and look up to her. I think she would have enjoyed the Free Love Movement and perhaps attended the Summer of Love in San Francisco. I think she would have been involved in protests and riots, and continued to loudly proclaim and defend what she believed in. Unfortunately, her potential was lost in a second, and her life was disrespected when the law found a way to favor social norms, expectations, and reputation, instead of concrete facts. May Betty’s memory be remembered for the individual she was, and may she rest in peace.

Betty is buried at Sunset Memorial Gardens in Odessa, Texas.

R.I.P Betty Williams

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Sources

• FindAGrave.com – Elizabeth Jean “Betty” Williams

• Texas Monthly – A Kiss Before Dying

• Women & Crime – Episode 125: Betty Williams